Differential installation

[Guarionex]

I am changing my differential in a couple of days. Is there any specific way to do this. Should I just follow instructions from the manual? Is there any trick to it? Want to save some frustration. It will be replaced with a similar one.

thanks

Oswaldo

[finkbuilt]

Dont drop that sucker on your hand as you take out the last bolt. they are heavier than they look, especially while lying on your back under the car.

Support it with a jack on the way down.

That's all I can think of. Pretty straight forward operation.

[BillWilliams]

The disconnection of the driveshaft is the most difficult/time consuming.

A helper makes it go much faster. It seems there is only one place you can get a wrench to the nuts. Break each nut loose having the helper pull on the e-brake as you apply force. Rotate the driveshaft, repeat.

Then if you can get your hands on one of those ratcheting wrenches, it will speed up the removal of those nuts. I just do not like to break loose nuts or bolts loose with ratcheting wrenches.

[BillWilliams]

To Finkbuilt's point, if doing by myself, I place a floor jack under the differential to help lower and control it.

[Bill_Riblett]

The disconnection of the driveshaft is the most difficult/time consuming.

A helper makes it go much faster. It seems there is only one place you can get a wrench to the nuts. Break each nut loose having the helper pull on the e-brake as you apply force. Rotate the driveshaft, repeat.

Then if you can get your hands on one of those ratcheting wrenches, it will speed up the removal of those nuts. I just do not like to break loose nuts or bolts loose with ratcheting wrenches.

I've been able to stick a large screwdriver into the rear U-joint to hold the driveshaft while loosening the nuts.

[williamggruff]

Be prepared to employ the farmer's breaker bar in your efforts to loosen the driveshaft bolts. This involves finding a steel or iron pipe in your barn or basement, and sliding it over the handle of your wratchet or spanner to increase the length of your lever arm. Hopefully you don't plan on doing the removal today, so you can spray the bolts with a loosener a full day before you climb under the car with a wrench. 30+ years of exposure to road grime will most likely have given the driveshaft bolts a pretty firm grip on their nuts, no pun intended, unless you find that kind of thing funny.

williamggruff

[Guarionex]

thanks a lot to everyone. I appreciate your advise. I feel much better and motivated to get down there and start to get those nuts out.

saludos

Oswaldo

[thehackmechanic]

Clean the 35 years of mung out out the hex sockets in the allen head bolts holding on the half-axle shafts. Use a little screwdriver to dig the dirt out. Undoing these hex bolts is so much easier and quicker with air tools. The reason that God made air tools and impact wrenches were to pull these halfshafts off. I think the hex heads are also less likely to strip when using an impact wrench (as opposed to twisting on a ratchet handle). Either way, make sure the hex bit is seated in there well (I tap mine with a small hammer first), then whacka-whackta WHEEEE and it's out. Repeat 12 times. But the other posters are right about the driveshaft nuts -- air tools don't help you there; there's no clearance.

[rgiles675]

I just did this and it was A LOT easier with another person helping while you are under the car. The trick I had was not stripping the hex bolts that hold the axles to the diff...What i did to solve that issue was have one person on a pair of vice grips and one person on a hex wrench (socket type) and turn at the same time... they should go easy...also use lots of pblast...WORKS AMAZINGLY AND GOES FAST...as for the drive shaft bolts..I def had to use a breaker bar.

Good luck and let us know how it goes.

Ryan